FanExpo '13: Highlights From The MARVEL: INFINITY & BEYOND Panel

Tom Brevoort, Ellie Pyle joined Kathryn and Stuart Immonen for an intimate fan Q/A session at FanExpo Canada this weekend and we were in attendance! Find out what these creators are up to, as well as some interesting tidbits about Marvel!

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By Alex Lynch - 8/23/2013

Unfortunately, Marvel has claimed that their convention presence for anything other than NYCC/SDCC is going to be really small, so if you have a local convention coming up with Marvel guests, do NOT expect a booth. They claim that it was much too expensive to build and ship it all over the world. Anyways, Marvel also did NOT have any visual covers to show us during the panel, so it was a very great fan discussion to be had. It started 30 minutes early with Tom Brevoort doing a "pre-panel" talk, and some highlights from that are included below. Ellie Pyle and Kathryn and Stuart Immonen later joined him at the panel start time.

"Does Marvel have any plans for Star Wars?"; Tom Brevoort said not at the moment, considering Dark Horse still has the rights.

"What's Peter David doing after X-Factor?"; Brevoort couldn't say or give any details but he's been working on a project.

"What repercussions will Age Of Ultron ultimately have?"; For starters, Ultron won't be appearing in All New X-Men, but the Marvel Universe's timeline is quite fractured, and the X-Men being in the wrong timeline will have some sort of issues that will be addressed.

"Why should readers be concerned/care about Angela?"; Joe Quesada spent an enormous time getting her into the Marvel Universe and making it work considering she's had history from years ago. It all starts in Guardians Of The Galaxy.

"When could we see ROM or The Micronauts show up?"; Marvel does not have the rights to ROM and only some of the micronauts.

"What do you guys think about Daredevil playing Batman?"; Pyle: "That could be cool. We'll see."

"What's next for Tony Stark after The Secret Origins Of Iron Man?; Tony will have two big earth-shattering revelations coming soon which lay the backdrop for an upcoming story where Tony is back on Earth.

"When can we see more of Squirrel Girl?"; Dan Slott is always coming up with ideas for her, but Brevoort jokingly said that he "hasn't written this week's Spider-Man yet!" and that maybe we can see her again after "Dan Slott is finished destroying Spider-Man and only has Squirrel Girl left."

"How hard is it to keep secrets from the internet?"; Very good discussion here, too much to note, audience member noted that sometimes DC may change a story if it leaks (not sure how true that is.) and Ellie Pyle noted that there is no point to changing a story if it leaks because you came up with a good story that makes sense. The hardest secret for her to keep was Amazing Spider-Man #700 especially since solicits come out 3 months prior to the comic. Also, they kept contradicting what they said about the comic, so it was really confusing to fans. The story stayed secret two days before 698 was published, and it wasn't fun for the fans who don't want the story ruined. Also, Stuart Immonen laughs off how he has no idea how Brian Michael Bendis can post turned in All New X-Men pages on his Tumblr about a day after completion.

"When are we going to get another Alpha Flight ongoing?"; We probably won't, considering they've tried many times and the book never sells as expected. They don't try to pinpoint why, but they love the characters and would love to do something with them.

Now is some talk about the correlation between Marvel mainstream media (films/comics/animation) and the comic books. There isn't much, but as long as there is recognition between the characters, that's what they want. It's also noted how they get comic book artists/authors to help on the shows as Stuart Immonen did some designs for Ultimate Spider-Man.

"Could we see an AGENTS OF S.H.I.E.L.D tie-in?"; Brevoort says there are no plans, but since Marvel publishes graphic novels based on ABC shows (Once Upon A Time, Castle) it could happen like that, or they could launch a new SHIELD book. He recommends reading Secret Avengers

And those are all the major and interesting tidbits I took note of during this panel. Stay tuned for our coverage on the DC All-Access panel which had some visual content and great discussion, and our hands-on demo impressions of Beyond: Two Souls and Batman: Arkham Origins. We'll also be bringing you more panel coverage as the weekend moves on.

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Brevoort is a jerk. Look up his online Q&A from a year or two ago when he was asked about NOVA and told repeatedly that the new Nova sucked, Rich Rider was the bomb, and Marvel needed to bring him back. He was like a petulant child, very disrespectful to hardcore fans. Basically, its out character and we do what we want so suck it. Haven't bought a Marvel title since...and I used to buy a LOT (about 13-15 books a month). Remember who brung ya to the show man.

I'm not a Sam Alexander fan by I support Marvel's certain to try something new. I was around when DC turned Hal Jordan into villain and promptly replaced him with Kyle Raynor. Almost immediately H.E.A.T. (an organized coalition of Hal Jordan fans) formed and inundated DC with vitriol. But you know what Kyle Raynor became every bit of awesome that Hal was and ultimately it made the GL mythos stronger. Everything that made Johns' GL run great came from that business. Rich Rider will come back one day (it's comics). If I've learned anything in my time as a comics fan is that they always come back and best stories emerge from surprising sources. One day people may grow to hold Sam Alexandet in the same regard as Rich Rider (Who by the way was a young hero for a very long time until Annihilation).